Johannesburg - At least 2 000 smart card identity documents (IDs) have been issued by two banks since August through a pilot project with the Department of Home Affairs, the department said on Wednesday.
The cards were issued by Standard Bank and First National Bank (FNB) to employees at the institutions’s head offices in the Johannesburg CBD. The smart card campaign was launched by the department earlier this year to do away with the green barcoded identity books.
The department’s director general Mkhuseli Apleni said his department had to use the banks’ innovation to roll out the new smart cards.
“We would not have such capacity as the banks, so this is helping the department in sharing this national responsibility. We have millions of people with green identity books in our system, it would take months for the department to process them on its own,” he said.
Apleni and Minister Malusi Gigaba visited the two banks’ head offices in Johannesburg to check on progress by the two institutions.
Standard Bank, Nedbank, and FNB had signed memorandum of understanding with the department to help roll the project. The system was being tested through issuing the cards to employees first before it could be opened for the public.
FNB CEO Jaqcues Cilliers said the process was easier as the employees were easily identified by the bank’s system. There were no cash transactions, applicants paid the R140 fee though speed points, said Celliers.
ANA